"All this region is very level and full of forests, vines and butternut trees. No Christian has ever visited this land and we had all the misery of the world trying to paddle the river upstream." Samuel de Champlain

Testing done on snapping turtle road kill in Ontario found most of the creatures to be a toxic soup of PCBs and mercury, Ontario Nature Staff Ecologist John Urquhart says.

Opponents of the Ontario Snapping Turtle hunt say the population cannot withstand the combined pressures of pollution, cars, disappearing habitat and hunting given their low rate of reproduction.

An 11,000-signature petition calling for an end to the snapping turtle hunt will be presented to the Ontario legislature this week (end of February 2012).

"The amount of snapping turtles dying on roads in Ontario is more than enough to cause a decline in just about every population near a road," Urquhart said. "In addition to that, 70% of the wetlands in southern Ontario are gone."

A new report by the David Suzuki Foundation, Ontario Nature and the Kawartha Turtle Trauma Centre, says snapping turtles have been around for 40 million years but are now being pushed to the brink.

"The Road to Extinction: A Call to End the Snapping Turtle Hunt highlights a controversial provincial policy that allows snappers to be hunted, despite being listed as a species at risk and identifies eight hotspots where thousands of turtles are being run over and killed by cars each year," a news release says.

Ontarians with a regular fishing licence are allowed to bag up to two snapping turtles a day.

Yet, people taking turtles may not realize what they're eating, he said.

Researchers sent the carcasses of snapping turtles killed by cars for analysis.

"Nine of the 12 turtles that we had tested ... were at a level that was unsafe for any woman of childbearing age or any child under the age of 15," Urquhart said of the PCB levels, noting three of the turtles were not safe for anyone to consume. "If you eat snapping turtles, because they live so long, it could be really hazardous to your health depending how old the turtle is and where you hunt from."

There are no provincial guidelines on eating turtles like there are for fish, he said.

Mercury levels were under maximum levels recommended for consumption, but the chemical was present in all the turtles tested, he said.

The groups are hoping to convince the Ontario Legislature to ban the hunting of snapping turtles and to install wildlife passages in road mortality hotspots."

I'm the second generation of my family that lives in Richelieu, Quebec, in Canada. My family tree, both from my mother's and my father's side, has its roots in Quebec since the beginning of the 1600s: my ancestors crossed the ocean from France, leaving Perche and Normandy behind them. Both French AND English are my mother tongues: I learned to talk in both languages when I was a baby, and both my parents were perfectly bilingual too.